It is known to form walls from building elements which are vertically extended extruded hollow members. Adjacent members are connected by cooperating flanges and grooves with the elements joined by longitudinal sliding relative movement. The elements are hollow and are subsequently filled with concrete to provide them with strength and rigidity. Typically, the building elements are formed of extruded plastics material.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,212,845 discloses a building element typically as described above. A wall is constructed by connecting adjacent elements by first connecting one element to a floor and then coupling subsequent elements thereto by vertically sliding relative motion. A similar construction is also disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,189,269, 5,974,751, 5,953,880, 5,729,944 and 5,706,620.
The above discussed elements have a disadvantage in that their sliding relative movement for coupling purposes hinders their assembly. Their lengths makes them difficult to handle when being placed in position to form a wall.
A further disadvantage is that each element has either two male or two female coupling portions. Thus there is the need to manufacture and stock a variety of different elements.
Less relevant structures are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,440,785, 3,555,751, 3,815,311, 3,828,502, 4,104,837, 5,274,975, 5,293,728, 5,404,686 and 6,247,280.